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In 1976 the British astronomer Patrick Moore announced on BBC Radio 2 that at 9:47 AM a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event was going to occur that listeners could experience in their very own homes. The planet Pluto would pass behind Jupiter, temporarily causing a gravitational alignment that would counteract and lessen the Earth’s own gravity. Moore told his listeners that if they jumped in the air at the exact moment that this planetary alignment occurred, they would experience a strange floating sensation. When 9:47 AM arrived, BBC2 began to receive hundreds of phone calls from listeners claiming to have felt the sensation. One woman even reported that she and her eleven friends had risen from their chairs and floated around the room.

The Case of the Interfering Brassieres In 1982 the Daily Mail reported that a local manufacturer had sold 10,000 “rogue bras” that were causing a unique and unprecedented problem, not to the wearers but to the public at large. Apparently the support wire in these bras had been made out of a kind of copper originally designed for use in fire alarms. When this copper came into contact with nylon and body heat, it produced static electricity which, in turn, was interfering with local television and radio broadcasts. The chief engineer of British Telecom, upon reading the article, immediately ordered that all his female laboratory employees disclose what type of bra they were wearing.

Man Flies By Own Lung Power In 1934 many American newspapers, including The New York Times, printed a photograph of a man flying through the air by means of a device powered only by the breath from his lungs. Accompanying articles excitedly described this miraculous new invention. The man, identified as German pilot Erich Kocher, blew into a box on his chest. This activated rotors that created a powerful suction effect, lifting him aloft. Skis on his feet served as landing gear, and a tail fin allowed him to steer. What the American papers didn’t realize was that the “lung-power motor” was a joke. The photo had first appeared in the April Fool’s Day edition of the Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung. It made its way to America thanks to Hearst’s International News Photo agency which not only fell for the hoax but also distributed it to all its U.S. subscribers. In the original Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung article, the pilot’s name was spelled “Erich Koycher,” which was a pun on the German word “keuchen,” meaning to puff or wheeze.

paint your families toenails in the night and watch their surprise in the morning!

carry your children out of bed and put them in their siblings beds, again much surprise in the morning!

Hide in the cupboard and grab someone’s leg when they open it

Put a gummy worm in your kid’s apple if they have packed lunches!

Go around the office and tell random people that a particular person (e.g. your friend) wanted them to drop over at 11am – they will be surprised when 50 people drop around to their cubicle at once.

Get a universal remote control and turn the volume up on all the TVs in your local TV shop, while standing nearby. Try be covert so you can keep doing it.

For a fruity April Fool’s practical joke, get a few gummy worms and carefully poke them into fresh fruit, particularly apples. Give mom or dad a wormy apple for lunch and leave a few apples on the table for friends and family members to snack on.Go with a couple of friends, stand near some busy street corner – stare and point up at the sky. Watch the reactions of people around you!

write: “Help, I’m lost in a toilet paper factory,” in toilet paper and whoever goes to the bathroom next will get a joke out of that one!

Open a bedroom door or any door that you know a lot of people will walk through and put a pillow at the top of it so when the person opens the door the pillow will hit them on the head.

Find all the balls in your house, even small plastic ones like ping pong balls, and place them in the kitchen cupboards. Whoever goes to open the cupboards will get a shower of balls

It was a gift of a day yesterday with puffs of cloud scudding across a blue sky, and golden spring sunshine. My kids are on their Easter break, a time when many parents feel the pressure to provide entertainment and expensive days out; the first second that you set foot inside a kid-oriented venue, there will be someone at hand to lighten your pockets. Why do you have to exit the zoo through the shop, why do you need an LED sword in order to enjoy a pantomime, why do our kids need to be tempted by overpriced and unhealthy snacks EVERYWHERE we go? Sometimes the more effort and expense involved in a day out, the more stress, less enjoyment and greater risk out burn-out, and/or disappointment. If you are fed up of spending holidays queuing with swarms of other stressed parents and hoards of spoilt kids, returning home in the car to half an hour of tired bickering and pockets full of sticky wrappers and plastic junk, simply opt out! Arm yourself against pester-power and let the spring time be your theme-park!

Yesterday I spent a perfect sunny afternoon with a friend and our four children out in the woods and fields. We took a bag with some water, bread and raisins, some binoculars, a camera, blanket and a wild flower guide. The kids mucked about in the stream, poked sticks under rocks, explored the woods, ran in the fields and had a great time. My friend and I even had the time to laze on a primrose bank, soak up some sun and watch them bumbling around at a distance, enjoying some of the independence and freedom that city kids rarely experience. The afternoon was fantastic, everyone has lots of fun, it cost only the petrol to get there, and there was no whining and pestering about wanting this or that; pure simple enjoyment. All the kids are desperate to get back and re-explore their favorite places.

A simple day out is a healthy-option for the holidays. All you need is a little preparation; wellies, spare clothes in the car in the event of over-enthusiastic puddle stamping, a bag of fruit and water and a few good ideas to keep all ages happy;

Take wild flower or animal guides, a flower press, or camera.

Build a bivouac or shelter with bigger kids.

Find a bridge or stream for pooh sticks, or build little boats or rafts from found materials to race with bigger kids.

Hold a roly-poly competition (ensure that you know what dock leaves look like).

Find a climbing tree, or logs to balance on (endless entertainment).

Keep it simple and energetic, and look for areas with plenty of places to explore and poke around in. Every time we do this I am freshly surprised by how much fun can be squeezed out of a simple walk, and fresh air and open space will let the kids blow away the cobwebs and fully exercise their bodies.

We have been led to believe that children can only be kept happy and educated if they are provided with an interactive button to press, a zillion opportunities to purchase souvenirs (which they will immediately leave under the bed and forget), and crammed full of kid junk food. There is a reason that we are fed this line, and it is that other people are making huge amounts of money out of our desire to keep our kids happy. But these things don’t always provide golden memories, happy smiling relaxed children and contented parents, in fact usually the opposite. Toddlers to teens will benefit from some time spent outside surrounded by nature and away from the endless noise and expense of the commercial world. So chuck some snacks and a blanket in a bag, and get out into the open with your family and friends to enjoy simple holiday pleasures.

Folk Tales is a monthly evening of story, music and other random acts which I discovered a few months ago and has substantially added to the already copious amounts of joy in my life. Last night there was a lovely French man making a wall of sound with the aid of us all clapping (fairly) rhythmically, a lovely guy who’d recently been on the TV show ‘Upstaged’ who did a lovely musical piece telling the life story of someone he’d met on a train, celebrating the ‘ordinary’ which is always nice…

There was a gorgeous story about a levitating princess and an amazing guitarist or two. It’s such a lovely atmospheric venue and great mixture of music, stories, songs, joy, moving moments and there’s also chocolate biscuits. Check out their site on MySpace.

We were so inspired that a few of us are re-waking the Bristol Storytelling Cafe open mic night at La Ruca from its dormancy, due to restart May 15th so please do come…

We’re also organising a fundraiser for the Precious Drops breast milk for neonatal babies fundraising appeal – a Celebration of Life evening of music, stories and comedy and there’s an adult Pirate Night in the offing (June 12th at the Landsdown) – evening of sea shanties, stories and music, pirate dress optional.

The boiler is slightly closer to being fixed but what with Nige re-plastering the kids’ bedroom wall and the contents of their room being in ours, the heating back off again and no hot water until tomorrow, it’s a bit chaotic to say the least.

The kids are monstrously tired after the bank holiday (a lot of catching up with lovely people) as are we and we’re so looking forward to our holiday to Spain to see my folks (first time out of the country for 2 years for me and nearly 3 for Nige), I’m dusting down my Spanish and to get into the spirit my mum’s sent me a black and red spotty flamenco dress which I fully intend to wear at festivals with my long dark curly hair wig. I was considering handing our orange quarters. Photo to follow…

I’ve been reading a book called Pirattitude – ‘So You Wanna Be a Pirate – Here’s How!’ which advocates imagining a song (not necessarily piratical) playing whenever you walk into a room. The choice of song is very important apparently and so far all I’ve come up with is ‘Nothing’s Gonna Stop us Now’ by Starship… Any thoughts welcome.

Despite this we’re definitely feeling light at the end of the proverbial child tunnel with the boys playing brilliantly together and insisting at the weekend that we don’t have to get up and that they’ll play in their room by themselves…

So I’ve been mistaken for a student twice recently – once by the grandad of a child whose party I was doing and once by a young guy who I realised in retrospect was probably chatting me up (it was dark) at a storytelling event I dashed to one evening on my own. It was when he asked how many people I lived with that I clicked (as I was half way through saying ‘3 guys’). Now despite my baby face I have a lot of grey hairs and a rapidly increasing number of wrinkles so I was both amazed and ecstatic about this mistake… The question is should I be flattered that they thought I looked young or a bit worried that they might be referring more to my scruffiness?

Check this out, if you look closely you may see a spotty sleeve, that’s me, my 1.5 secs of fame!

Developed by Dr Mandan Kataria, laughter yoga is amazingly therapeutic medically in terms of endorphin release, aerobic exercise, lung workout etc but also beneficial emotionally plus it’s lots of fun. The clip doesn’t really do it justice, I first went at a festival with about 150 people in a sweaty marquee ending with all our heads on someone else’s tummy in a snake laughing our socks off.